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      Trump’s 2nd-Term Agenda Could Transform Government and Foreign Affairs

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      The president-elect could reshape government and may dramatically transform foreign and domestic policy in a second term.As he declared victory, President-elect Donald J. Trump said that his mission now was nothing less than to “save our country.” His version of doing that involves an expansive agenda that would reshape government, foreign policy, national security, economics and domestic affairs as dramatically as any president in modern times.Over the course of the campaign, Mr. Trump outlined a set of policies for his second term that would be far more sweeping than what he enacted in his first. Without establishment Republicans and military veterans surrounding him to resist his more drastic ideas, Mr. Trump may find it easier to move ahead, particularly if his party completes its sweep by winning the House.Many of his policy prescriptions remain vague or change in detail depending on his mood or the day. But if he follows through on his campaign trail talk, he would restructure the government to make it more partisan, further cut taxes while imposing punishing tariffs on foreign goods, expand energy production, pull the United States back from overseas alliances, reverse longstanding health rules, prosecute his adversaries and round up theoretically millions of people living in the country illegally.“We’re going to do the best job,” Mr. Trump said in his victory speech. “We’re going to turn it around. It’s got to be turned around. It’s got to be turned around fast, and we’re going to turn it around. We’re going to do it in every way with so many ways, but we’re going to do it in every way. This will forever be remembered as the day the American people regained control of their country.”Having promised to devote his next four years in office to “retribution,” Mr. Trump plans to quickly shield himself from legal scrutiny, end criminal investigations against himself, pardon supporters who stormed the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, and turn the power of federal law enforcement against his adversaries.He has said he will fire Jack Smith, the special counsel who has brought indictments against him for mishandling classified documents and trying to overturn the 2020 election, and he has threatened to investigate President Biden, Vice President Kamala Harris and others who have angered him, including Republicans like Liz Cheney, the former congresswoman from Wyoming.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Pro-West Leader Wins High-Stakes Vote in Former Soviet Republic

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      The president of Moldova, Maia Sandu, won re-election on Sunday against a rival candidate she had denounced as “Moscow’s man.”The pro-Western president of Moldova, Maia Sandu, won re-election on Sunday in a high-stakes runoff vote in the former Soviet republic against a rival candidate she had denounced as “Moscow’s man.”The vote — held a week after a contested election in Georgia, another former Soviet territory, handed victory to the Moscow-leaning governing party — has been closely watched by the United States, the European Union and Russia as a critical test of Moldova’s direction.With more than 98 percent of ballots counted, official results gave Ms. Sandu 54.9 percent of the vote, an unassailable lead on her Moscow-friendly rival, who had 45.3 percent.In a televised address early Monday, she thanked Moldovans living abroad, whose vote tipped the result in her favor, but said the election was a victory for the whole country. “Today you saved Moldova,” she said. “In our choice for a dignified future, no one lost.”In an apparent reference to Russia, Ms. Sandu assailed “hostile forces from outside the country and criminal groups” for mounting a campaign to sway the result, which she said, citing “dirty money and illegal vote buying,” had been an “attack unprecedented in the whole of Europe’s history.”European leaders celebrated the election as a victory against what Poland’s prime minister, Donald Tusk, described as “Russia’s aggressive and massive interference.” He expressed hope “that this trend will continue in the coming days and months in other countries as well.”We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      COP16 Talks in Colombia Adopt a Novel Way to Pay for Conservation

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      The meeting created a fund that would compensate countries for the use of genetic information.Diplomats from roughly 180 countries ended two weeks of environmental talks on Saturday after agreeing on a new fund that would shift some of the profits from nature’s DNA to global conservation efforts.The agreement calls for companies that make money from genetic information stored in databases, known as digital sequence information, to pay into a fund as a sort of fee for the use of biodiversity.Scientific advances have made it easier and cheaper for researchers to sequence genetic material. That means there are now vast amounts available in databases for pharmaceutical, cosmetic, biotechnology and other companies to analyze as they seek to develop new products.Delegates at the talks, known as COP16, shorthand for the 16th Conference of the Parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity, called the agreement an important breakthrough.“Conservation is mostly funded by governments and philanthropy,” said Amber Scholz, who leads the science policy department at Leibniz Institute DSMZ, a German research institute that focuses on microbial and cellular biodiversity. “Now, businesses that profit from biodiversity will pay into a new fund.”The final declaration made the fund voluntary, saying that companies “should” contribute.The agreement lays out specifics on how much they should pay: 1 percent of their profits or 0.1 percent of their revenue, as a guideline. Governments are “invited” to take legislative or other measures to require companies to contribute.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      North Korea, in the Spotlight Over Ukraine, Launches a Long-Range Missile

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      The launch, into waters west of Japan, came shortly after the United States and South Korea criticized the North for sending troops to join Russia’s war. North Korea launched an intercontinental ballistic missile off its east coast on Thursday, South Korean defense officials said, shortly after the United States and South Korea condemned the country for deploying troops near Ukraine to join Russia’s war effort.The missile was fired from Pyongyang, the North Korean capital, at a deliberately steep angle so that it reached an unusually high altitude but did not fly over Japan, the South Korean military said in a brief statement. The missile landed in waters between North Korea and Japan.The military said it was analyzing data to learn more about the missile, but that it believed it was an ICBM. North Korea last tested a long-range missile​ in December, when it test-fired its solid-fueled Hwasong-18 ICBM.The launch on Thursday was the North’s first major weapons test since September, when it fired a new type of Hwasong-11 short-range ballistic missile, which it said could carry a “super-large” conventional warhead weighing 4.5 tons.On Wednesday, South Korean defense intelligence officials told lawmakers that North Korea might conduct long-range missile tests before the American presidential election next week. They also said that the North was preparing to conduct its seventh underground nuclear test, in a bid to raise tensions and gain diplomatic leverage with the next U.S. president. North Korea conducted its last nuclear test in 2017.In recent weeks, North Korea has posed a fresh security challenge to Washington and its allies by sending an estimated 11,000 troops to Russia to fight in its war against Ukraine. Thousands of them, outfitted with Russian uniforms and equipment, have moved closer to the front lines, preparing themselves for possible battle against Ukrainian troops, South Korean and American officials said.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Measured Comments From Israel and Iran on New Round of Strikes

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      Israel’s prime minister said Israeli airstrikes on Iran had achieved their goals, and Iranian officials did not threaten retaliation.Iran’s leaders emphasized on Sunday that they had a right to respond to Israel’s airstrikes a day earlier but appeared to take a measured tone, as Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said that the assault had achieved its objectives.Their comments came as Israeli and American negotiators headed to Qatar in an effort to revive long-stalled talks aimed at brokering a cease-fire in the Gaza Strip. Earlier, Israel carried out more deadly attacks in northern Gaza and in southern Lebanon.In his first public comments since Israeli warplanes struck Iran on Saturday, Mr. Netanyahu said the strikes — carried out in retaliation for a missile barrage Iran fired at Israel on Oct. 1 — had severely damaged Iran’s defensive capabilities and its ability to produce missiles.Iranian and Israeli officials told The New York Times that the strikes had destroyed air-defense systems that protect important energy sites but did not hit the facilities themselves. The Biden administration had urged Israel not to attack Iran’s oil and nuclear sites.Iran must now decide whether to respond.On Sunday, in his first public comments about the strikes, Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, said the strikes “should neither be magnified nor downplayed,” the Iranian state news agency IRNA reported. He did not appear to be explicitly calling for retaliation.Although Iranian officials emphasized that their country has the right to respond, Iran’s president, Masoud Pezeshkian, said late Saturday that the country would “answer any stupidity with wisdom and strategy.”We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Israel Struck Air Defenses Around Critical Iranian Energy Sites, Officials Say

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      Israel’s attacks on Iran early Saturday destroyed air-defense systems set up to protect several critical oil and petrochemical refineries, as well as systems guarding a large gas field and a major port in southern Iran, according to three Iranian officials and three senior Israeli defense officials.The sites targeted by Israel, according to the officials, included defenses at the sprawling Bandar Imam Khomeini petrochemical complex, in Khuzestan Province; at the major economic port Bandar Imam Khomeini, adjacent to it; and at the Abadan oil refinery. Air-defense systems were also struck in Ilam Province, at the refinery for the gas field, called Tange Bijar, said the officials, one of them with Iran’s oil ministry.The Iranian and Israeli officials familiar with the attacks spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss intelligence.Israel’s destruction of the air-defense systems has raised deep alarm in Iran, the three Iranian officials said, as critical energy and economic hubs are now vulnerable to future attacks if the cycle of retaliation between Iran and Israel continues.“Israel is sending a clear message to us,” said Hamid Hosseini, an expert on Iran’s oil and gas industry and a member of the Iran-Iraq Chamber of Commerce. “This can have very serious economic consequences for Iran, and now that we understand the stakes we need to act wise and not continue the tensions.”Iran’s military announced that four soldiers working with air defenses were killed in Israel’s attacks. The Iranian media said the casualty numbers would probably increase.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More